1) Free thing in LA every month. August's free activity was the Independent Shakespeare Festival's free performance of Hamlet in Griffith Park. It was really fun, and a fantastic performance! I'm glad lots of people came out and joined in on the picnic.
Also, Insomniac's Wrap Party was at Six Flags yesterday, so I suppose that can also count as a free event. As part of the gift package they gave us all free passes to the water park to use in September, so at the very least that'll be my September free-thing. I'll try and scare up a good public event as well. Potential events include...
Chinatown Summer Nights on 9/10 (http://chinatownsummernights.com/). Seems to involve food and music.
The Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy has lots of nature-related events throughout September: learning about snakes, stargazing hikes, wilderness survival skill lessons, etc. However, these are usually a bit of a drive and often parking is not free, so I'd want to get a bit more organized with a small group before doing any of them.
An Interfaith Choral Concert on 9/11
The Dubnoff Outdoor Festival on 9/24 in North Hollywood - food trucks, games, prizes, various bits of entertainment
Citywide Yard Sale in Santa Monica on 9/24
Vintage Paper Fair on 9/24 and 9/25 in Glendale (http://vintagepaperfair.com/) - old photography, pinups, brochures, post cards, stuff like that.
Redondo Pier Car Show, if you like cars, on 9/25
2) Games. Nick and I have been playing Deus Ex, and I like it very much! I'm actually doing more watching and back-seat gaming with this one, which leads me to question, does this count as playing? Perhaps I should explore back-seat gaming in an #AltDevBlogADay article
3) Sewing. I'm making things! With patterns! But I can't say what they are because they are for presents.
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Catwalk Story
Tonight on our walk, Mr. Davis got himself stuck. He'd squeezed through the railing and ended up on the wall next to the stairs that go down into our parking garage (there were some dogs in the courtyard and he was avoiding going around them through the gate).
He found himself perched on the very corner edge of the wall on the outside of the railing. It was too high for him to jump down, and too narrow for him to back up or turn to go back through the railing, so he meowed pitifully. I stood below him and reached my hands up, telling him it was okay and to come on. I honestly wasn't sure what he would do.
Mr. Davis looked at me for a moment, then jumped towards me and freefell. I caught him awkwardly and we moved on, but I was rather amazed that he didn't even try to jump *on* me, he just jumped and knew that I would catch him.
It's a nice feeling when a pet shows that they trust you.
He found himself perched on the very corner edge of the wall on the outside of the railing. It was too high for him to jump down, and too narrow for him to back up or turn to go back through the railing, so he meowed pitifully. I stood below him and reached my hands up, telling him it was okay and to come on. I honestly wasn't sure what he would do.
Mr. Davis looked at me for a moment, then jumped towards me and freefell. I caught him awkwardly and we moved on, but I was rather amazed that he didn't even try to jump *on* me, he just jumped and knew that I would catch him.
It's a nice feeling when a pet shows that they trust you.
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Where to Board Mr. Davis
Tonight I booked my flights for the Christmas Holidays, and now it's time to figure out where to board Mr. Davis while I'm gone. The place where I normally board him unfortunately has closed down, so I have to pick someplace new. I've narrowed it to two candidates, but am having trouble choosing between them.
Option A: The first place operates under the philosophy that cats who aren't from the same household never are allowed to free roam together, for a lower stress experience. They have great big tower kennels there, bigger than the ones at the last place I boarded, but since they don't let stranger cats out together, I imagine each cat only gets a couple of hours of out-and-about time outside their kennel each day.
Option B: The second place is the complete opposite. While they do have private rooms for non-social cats, their main boarding areas are large open community rooms, where cats can socialize together. This means that the cats have way more activity going on each day, as they hang out and play with the other cats.
Now, I liked the old place because it was sort of a mixture of the two. The cats each had their own big kennel, but were let out in groups for long periods of time.
I'm not sure what is best for Mr. Davis. Even though he doesn't like seeing other cats on his walks, he does fine with them in "neutral territory" environments, like the boarding house, and the shelter where he lived for a year which let their cats free roam. I'm still not sure about Option B, though, because there seems like fewer opportunities to mitigate in a situation where particular cats might not get along. At least with Option A, he could interact with other cats through the kennels when he was out during his roam time, I just worry he might not get enough of it every day.
Right now I'm leaning slightly towards Option A, though i'm going to contact them and ask how much out time each cat gets every day when they are booked full (which I imagine they will be during the holidays).
Option A: The first place operates under the philosophy that cats who aren't from the same household never are allowed to free roam together, for a lower stress experience. They have great big tower kennels there, bigger than the ones at the last place I boarded, but since they don't let stranger cats out together, I imagine each cat only gets a couple of hours of out-and-about time outside their kennel each day.
Option B: The second place is the complete opposite. While they do have private rooms for non-social cats, their main boarding areas are large open community rooms, where cats can socialize together. This means that the cats have way more activity going on each day, as they hang out and play with the other cats.
Now, I liked the old place because it was sort of a mixture of the two. The cats each had their own big kennel, but were let out in groups for long periods of time.
I'm not sure what is best for Mr. Davis. Even though he doesn't like seeing other cats on his walks, he does fine with them in "neutral territory" environments, like the boarding house, and the shelter where he lived for a year which let their cats free roam. I'm still not sure about Option B, though, because there seems like fewer opportunities to mitigate in a situation where particular cats might not get along. At least with Option A, he could interact with other cats through the kennels when he was out during his roam time, I just worry he might not get enough of it every day.
Right now I'm leaning slightly towards Option A, though i'm going to contact them and ask how much out time each cat gets every day when they are booked full (which I imagine they will be during the holidays).
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Goal Progress Report
1) Free Thing in LA Every Month. Since my parents were in town in July, we went down to El Pueblo and then on to Little Tokyo where a music and arts festival was going on. It mostly made me hungry for Japan, but was a nice walk, and I'd never been down near MOCA before to see all that artsy stuff, so it worked out well. The rest of July was filled with non-free events (NASL and MLG).
For August, I was thinking of hitting up the Griffith Park Free Shakespeare Festival, because my parents' visit made me homesick and it reminds me of Shakespeare in the Park in Louisville. I'm thinking of trying to catch either Love's Labour's Lost or Hamlet, either the weekend of the 13th or the 20th. If you want to come have a picnic with me, let me know!
2) Games. I have actually been playing a TON of games recently, but a lot of it has been research for work, so I don't think it counts for this goal. Other than that, I've been enjoying Outland immensely. If you haven't seen it yet, it's a really fast and snappy platformer combined with color-switching bullet hell (like Ikaruga). Unlike Ikaruga, though, the platforming aspect of it lets you pace yourself, and learn more slowly, so you get less panicky and spammy.
The other game I've been playing a lot for fun is Sanctum, which is a first-person-shooter tower defense game. I really like the solutions they came up with for constructing defenses in a first person view. It's also a very mild shooter, since once the defense starts, you usually just teleport to various locations in your map, and shoot from a stationary position. Running and gunning is entirely optional.
Meanwhile, there were a few re-releases (other than Stranger's Wrath) that I was looking forward to, but I've completely forgotten which ones they were now, doh! I guess when they pop up in the PSN store, I will remember :)
For August, I was thinking of hitting up the Griffith Park Free Shakespeare Festival, because my parents' visit made me homesick and it reminds me of Shakespeare in the Park in Louisville. I'm thinking of trying to catch either Love's Labour's Lost or Hamlet, either the weekend of the 13th or the 20th. If you want to come have a picnic with me, let me know!
2) Games. I have actually been playing a TON of games recently, but a lot of it has been research for work, so I don't think it counts for this goal. Other than that, I've been enjoying Outland immensely. If you haven't seen it yet, it's a really fast and snappy platformer combined with color-switching bullet hell (like Ikaruga). Unlike Ikaruga, though, the platforming aspect of it lets you pace yourself, and learn more slowly, so you get less panicky and spammy.
The other game I've been playing a lot for fun is Sanctum, which is a first-person-shooter tower defense game. I really like the solutions they came up with for constructing defenses in a first person view. It's also a very mild shooter, since once the defense starts, you usually just teleport to various locations in your map, and shoot from a stationary position. Running and gunning is entirely optional.
Meanwhile, there were a few re-releases (other than Stranger's Wrath) that I was looking forward to, but I've completely forgotten which ones they were now, doh! I guess when they pop up in the PSN store, I will remember :)
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